Amazon's Robot Workforce Grows By 50 Percent In Just One Year (siliconrepublic.com)

Amazon hires a lot of people. But the expansion of its army of orange-wheeled robots is more than keeping pace. An anonymous reader writes: E-commerce and cloud giant Amazon has revealed that it now has 45,000 robots across 20 fulfilment centres around the world. This is a 50 percent increase on the same time last year, when the company said that it employed 30,000 robots alongside its 306,000 people. Amazon uses the robots to automate the picking and packing process at large warehouses. The robots are 16in tall and weigh 145kg. They can travel at 5mph and can carry packages that weigh 317kg. The robots became part of the company's workforce when Amazon acquired Kiva Systems in 2012 for $775m.

Comments

correction from the article.

[nimbius]

The robots became part of the company's workforce when Amazon acquired Kiva Systems in 2012 for $775m.

the specifications for the robots are not correct at all. these machines weigh slightly more than 340 kilograms, can travel at up to 60 miles per hour, do not feel hunger, sorrow, or pain, and are all equipped with a phased plasma rifle typically in the 40 watt range.

regards,
Kiva_prod_32423.aws.amazon.com
A regular human worker employee.

Re:correction from the article.

[INT_QRK]

You also forgot to mention that they steal old people's pills, which concerns me as I'm not getting any younger, and they're all over the lawn. Get off.

Is it just me to worry about the new Amazon?

[presidenteloco]

Robots that make things connected to drones that deliver things, all run by a computer algorithm in the cloud that no single human understands.

What could possibly go wrong?

Re:Is it just me to worry about the new Amazon?

[Locke2005]

Just for grins and giggles, they should name the drone delivery system "Skynet"!

Re:Is it just me to worry about the new Amazon?

[Joe_Dragon]

No one has the cash to buy anything after being put out of work. Or the taxes get very high when people start turning to the er / jail / prison as there doctor.

Don't worry, Trump will deport them

[fodder69]

Send those suckers back to China where they were probably made and give those jobs back to American robots.

Not necessarily

[rsilvergun]

there's a third dystopia nobody likes to talk about, where the masses are simply left to starve to death while the entire world's resources are claimed by the 1%. I mean, if they have robots to make everything and the control access to food/shelter/health care/etc then why bother with employees? What the hell difference does it make if somebody buys your crap when you already own everything? The few of them you want for cooking food/doctors/engineers/military/sex workers/ will do as you say or they'll starve to death. And your robot guns will cut them down if they try to rebel.